(Resources listed here reference more than one reading and are normally shorter than the resources listed under the individual texts above. If you are looking to link the readings, check these resources.)

(Resources listed here reference more than one reading and are normally shorter than the resources listed under the individual texts above. If you are looking to link the readings, check these resources.)

("In her book There Was No Path So I Trod One, Edwina Gateley's poem Called to Say Yes reminds us that our Christian calling is to say no to death in all its many forms. We can do better. And we do better by saying yes to life. 'We are called to say yes. That the kingdom might break through To renew and to transform Our dark and groping world....")

("At a flower service, everyone brings a bouquet of flowers and places them on a table in front of the pulpit. These bouquets are just a large fistful of flowers from the garden and wild flowers from the fields and woods. Then the minister preaches a sermon on Matthew 5:23-24, stressing the need for harmony and peace in the congregation and reminding people of Our Lord's admonition to make peace with our neighbor before kneeling at the altar to pray to God. After the sermon, a genuinely amazing "passing of the peace" takes place...")

("But somewhere in his darkness, Gerard Manley Hopkins experienced God's light. Somehow he moved beyond self-reproach to divine mercy. In one of my favorite poems, My Own Heart, he portrays an interior conversation about extending mercy to himself and accepting 'God's smile' upon his life. 'My own heart let me more have pity on; let Me live to my sad self hereafter kind, Charitable; not live this tormented mind With this tormented mind tormenting yet...")

("The movie 127 Hours is the true story of a young man whose arm got trapped under a rock while he was hiking. After days of trying to get the rock off his arm he decided he couldn't and that he was going to die. Then, he says, he had a moment of clarity, he didn't have to die, but he did have to lose his hand and part of his arm. And with a pocket knife, he cut off his own arm. And lived to tell the tale...")

The seed-plant-water-grow sequence offers the opportunity to think about the church in the context of gardening or farming. In the painting that is considered his masterpiece, Scottish artist William York MacGregor, shows a vegetable stall filled with cabbages, rhubarb, leeks, potatoes, onions and more. It is a reminder that those seeds that are planted by Paul (or whomever) are seeds for a variety of produce.